What makes stuff sticky?

CrowdScience

BBC

Science

4.8 • 985 Ratings

🗓️ 3 December 2021

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What makes things sticky? Listener Mitch from the USA began wondering while he was taking down some very sticky wallpaper. Our world would quite literally fall apart without adhesives. They are almost everywhere – in our buildings, in our cars and in our smartphones. But how do they hold things together?

To find out, presenter Marnie Chesterton visits a luthier, Anette Fajardo, who uses animal glues every day in her job making violins. These glues have been used since the ancient Egyptians –but adhesives are much older than that. Marnie speaks to archaeologist Dr Geeske Langejans from Delft University of Technology about prehistoric glues made from birch bark, dated to 200,000 years ago. She goes to see a chemist, Prof Steven Abbott, who helps her understand why anything actually sticks to anything else. And she speaks to physicist Dr Ivan Vera-Marun at the University of Manchester, about the nanotechnologists using adhesion at tiny scales to make materials of the future.

Presented by Marnie Chesterton. Produced by Anand Jagatia for BBC World Service

This episode was originally broadcast on 2nd October 2020

Transcript

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0:00.0	Take some time for yourself with soothing classical music from the mindful mix, the Science of
0:07.0	Happiness Podcast.
0:08.0	For the last 20 years I've dedicated my career to exploring the science of living a happier more meaningful life and I want
0:14.4	to share that science with you.
0:16.1	And just one thing, deep calm with Michael Mosley.
0:19.4	I want to help you tap in to your hidden relaxation response system and open the door to that
0:25.5	calmer place within. Listen on BBC Sounds.
0:29.7	This is crowd science from the BBC World Service.
0:35.0	I'm Marnie Chesterton and you can hear the sound of a violin because I've come to visit
0:42.2	Aleutia, someone who makes them.
0:45.0	My name is Annette for Hardo. I'm a violin maker.
0:49.0	What I mostly do is restoration and repairs of old instruments like 17th, 18th, 19th century.
0:55.0	Okay, so hundreds of years old?
0:58.0	Some of them, yes.
0:59.0	And usually instruments suffer mostly from is the human influence being
1:05.7	bashed and having accidents having body contact deteriorating that way.
1:10.0	Okay so you must have really steady hands.
1:13.0	Not too much coffee in the morning is a good idea.
1:16.0	There are instruments in this room worth hundreds of thousands of dollars,
1:20.0	but what I'm really interested in is the stuff that's holding them together.
1:24.7	I'm just wondering how important are glues to your job?
1:29.7	Really crucial, our main working material is animal glue. And within animal glue there's a whole range of different types.
	...

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